Why I Chose… FIU

It came that time to search for the next step, a university. A few different packets came in, including Vassar, Occidental College, and even The College London.

They were very expensive, and I didn't see how I was going to go. I didn't think about loans, and I didn't think I wanted any. So, I looked inward, and did the multi-university application for Florida, checking only FSU and FIU.

I knew a bunch of my high school friends were going to UF, and that was enough of a deterrent. I wanted to try making new friends after being with the same people for, a good number of them, almost four years. I wanted new experiences, especially since I'd felt so… disenchanted that high school life wasn't like Clueless. I wanted to try remaking myself again.

I wanted to be away from my family, yet close enough that I could visit comfort when I felt like it.

I'd become a burgeoning homosexual who'd only just begun to explore things and that would be another plus, going to university. Ultimately, I chose FIU because I felt I'd be closer to the "gay life." And I did grow in that regard. I had a number of experiences about which I could probably write a book, and I helped form, and eventually became a brother of,  my Delta Lambda Phi chapter.

I became an Anthropology degree graduate. I'd increased my Japanese ability. I'd even started my Masters in Linguistics, though I didn't follow through with my first semester (something which probably has left a dark mark for me with many of the faculty). I had promise.

I just feared debt, especially. Looking back, they probably would have helped me had I given them the opportunity. I was so insular.

But I chose FIU because I believed it would grant me a trove of memories and experiences about which I can reflect, and would allow me to grow as a person.

That it did.

Users are fleeing LiveJournal over Russian owners' hidden anti-LGBTQ terms

Users are fleeing LiveJournal over Russian owners' hidden anti-LGBTQ terms

From Gay Rights, a Flipboard topic

Remember LiveJournal, the online blogging service popular with fanfiction users during the early 2000s? Well, LiveJournal…

Read it on Flipboard

Read it on dailydot.com

Wow, I didn't even think about it like that…

I'd logged into the mobile LiveJournal app a few days ago and the new Terms of Service translation popped up. They'd made sure to note it was not legally binding (only the original Russian would be). I'd read it, because it now being fully Russian, I wondered if there would be anything overtly talking about gay things... Naturally, not, because who says things like that in legal documents most of the time?

Actually some, yes, but only when they don't want to be completely obscure about it.

So, I'd not really thought about it until I'd seen this article, and I suppose they might have a point. I want to justify it somewhat, saying I'm safe because I have a Friends-Only journal, but that isn't the point. People can't express themselves as they'd like.

Every website has its rules. Tumblr has a no pornographic video rule, and I think it's partly because people were/are using it as a giant, free file sharing service for, among other things, "copyrighted" "amateur" gay pornography.

Yes, I use scare quotes. I have a certain opinion about that too.

Back to my first-thought sort-of-defending-them. I'm not sure what I really want to do. That LiveJournal has been there through some of my most tumultuous life moments, and it's been a repository for a lot of my stories, even if I'm the only one of my friends who's still be regularly contributing to it.

Literally, the only people on my feed are Keith R.A. DeCandido, and me. A Japanese learners' community had a post a couple days ago, and that had surprised me. I'll have to see what comes.

Harlots...

Click here to watch videos from this show

Harlots 1 Episode, 4 Clips Margaret Wells struggles to reconcile her roles as brothel owner and mother to daughters Charlotte and Lucy. When her business comes under attack from Lydia Quigley, a rival madam with a ... Check out videos from this show on Hulu

This premiere was a romp… So, I'd seen teasers of it while watching other shows on Hulu, and added it to my Watchlist for when it should come out.

So, starting out, I had concerns it would leave me feeling not-so-good about it like that Jeffery Donovan show Shut Eye did. With that show, I'd only watched the premiere and didn't continue. This one, with all the sex to begin with, I don't know if it was to get it out of their systems or to try and entice people into their world.

Granted, if this were a bunch of good-looking men having relations with each other, I'd probably be feeling another way.

It took them about 15 minutes to really get it out of their system, and I'm glad they'd brought in more of the clever humor they'd more lightly interspersed with the sex scenes. Still, I suppose it is rather historically telling: these things more than likely were what this side 18th-century London had to offer. Including the not-so-aesthetic men.

I found myself trying to learn their names, which is a good sign. I can't help wondering what a gay black dude in this time would've had to resort to, though.

Let's see what next week brings (and I hope there's a gay guy to add something else to this menagerie).

When We Rise

	When We Rise (@WhenWeRiseABC)
3/2/17, 10:52 PM 💔💔💔💔💔 #WhenWeRise pic.twitter.com/2yYkNpQTi7

申す… I tell you…

This event is almost done, and it's stirred up all kinds of things in me. I'd probably not have noticed the series if not for a Hulu ad one day last week, and I'd looked forward to watching it.

Except, I feel terrible. It brings up all these feelings of resentment and discontent for me, and it's not even because of the treatment of GLBT people in the past or today. It's partly because of not feeling like a part of anything really, and partly because I don't make myself a part of anything.

I'm gay. I've known that "officially" for 18 years now. I've experienced things I still remember and wonder about, and there are things others have experienced that teeter between me not electing to do these things and me not in the path to experiencing them.

I've never been in a relationship. I may never be. The way I've come to be gets in the way of that some, and it's partly because I don't seem to fit the mould gay people around here seem to want.

Example 1

 

A toned white guy with model looks and abs.

Example 2

 

A black guy with black identity markers. I'm generally too "Oreo".

Example 3

 

A Latino of virtually any sort.

Example 4

 

Your stereotypical hot, confident Asian guy.

People tell me I look better without glasses. I can see that, but I haven't liked wearing contacts for a while now, and I'm not so sure about eye surgery. I cut my own hair, so I don't have the "professionally cut" look. I'm nerdy (but apparently the really hot thing is being into video games, which I'm not). Essentially, there are a lot of things I elect to do that strike against me.

Then there are guys who come after me that I don't particularly fancy, but that's another story.

Seeing just a snippet of these people's lives, which include falling in love, is heartbreaking. What is it these people have that I don't, or what do they do that I haven't? Yes, it's a made-for-television, based-on-a-true-story telecast with æsthetically pleasing people. I'm not seeing the failures in between, not in the way I'd gripe about.

How many eggs does one have to crack to get a cake?

People say it's getting out there and meeting people. It's about taking risks in exposing yourself to others.

I suppose I feel terrible because I can't really work myself up to that. Maybe ever. I'm slowly becoming fine with that, but seeing shows like this don't make it easier.

Gay Magic

Ex-college swimmer discovered there’s a magic in being gay

From LGBT progress, a Flipboard magazine by LGBTprogress

Luke Marshall is at peace as he reflects on his journey.If you're really young, don't let anyone tell you that you don't understand your…

Read it on Flipboard

Read it on outsports.com

So, being homosexual was never easy. I'd come out to two sets of people important to me by notes, followed by a family meeting, followed by a wandering mind that betrayed itself during attendance.

I sometimes wish I could say I was normative. I'm soft-spoken, sensitive, and not into the traditionally male-gendered likes of playing/watching sports or being intensely active outdoors (aside from going for long walks, which wouldn't be intense, really).

I'd had to really read this a few times to get what he'd meant in saying "magic", but I suppose so.

Empirical Evidence

	huffpostgay (@huffpostgay)
2/10/15, 6:30 PM How a same-sex kiss could have derailed the new Fox hit "Empire" huff.to/17aercU

I would say this could have read "How a same-sex kiss may derail 'Empire'"… or perhaps it should if I base it on what the article seems to say.

They'd addressed inherent homophobic tendencies the audience may have because the test audience rejected the show outright with the kiss scene (which I have not seen; I've not watched the show because I just haven't felt like it). 

Stating they'd done the scene early in the series and the fact apparently the show is having splendid ratings together seem to indicate this is a test audience false positive.

I don't know. Maybe I'll try the show?

Grab Your Big Pouch

http://youtu.be/_-fOJgsUEPU

I had seen this commercial on live TV maybe only twice, but on Internet streaming it's popped up a little more. 

Every time I see it, I think a few things:

1) This Big Pouch Man character is quirky and pretty attractive. When he's upside-down you don't see it, but the moment he uprights himself in the back seat, you can see it, especially in the eyes.

2) His character is also kind of creepy. It almost seems they're making double-entendres with the product. This is fine, and I'd giggled. Simultaneously, is the character of the driving test guy supposed to be a teenager or an adult still living with mum? Perhaps it's that California's driving test age is

18, in which case it's "fine"?

3) The creepiness is kind of hot. 

Because the commercial is just barely kind of edgy, that might be why it's not gotten as much airtime, seemingly, on live television, but I'm glad for the Internet and it's archival of human creation, destruction, and weirdness.

Risk of Positivity

Craig Davis sentenced to 10 years
http://www.myfoxatlanta.com/story/24788331/craig-davis-sentanced-to-10-years

You know, this really kind of gets to me. This is the second high-profile-ish "I-have-HIV/AIDS-but-I'm-going-to-sleep-around-anyway-and-btw-I'm-straight-identifying" trial that's gone on in this state since 2014 broke.

It's pretty angering, actually, because… well, okay. The supposed Bareback Brotherhood — and sorry if it ruffles feathers bringing it up — does this all the time, and I think the defense I've heard is that if people want to go around doing this at he risk of infection it's their business (For those who don't know, that group is a bunch of loosely-affiliated group of mostly gay and bisexual men who'd been rather vocal in 2010-ish on the Internet, who eschew condom use during anal sex under any conditions. The backlash to them has been strong that I think that's why I only hear ably them sporadically nowadays.). They at least seem to understand it's a risk and thus announce their beliefs and lifestyle openly (sometimes with blissful ignorance) that others might understand (or "understand") and act accordingly. 

With this case, though, these poor women, they not only could get infected themselves, but because they're women they could become pregnant, bringing something akin to what happens in a lot of the developing world — because it's almost they don't know better— to the United States. It brings the fear, hate, and uncertainty hundreds of thousands of women primarily in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and South Africa feel to the United States.

And then somehow, I think these guys do this because they may have some homosexual hangups like a lot of Black guys have: go sleeping around because they want to prove they're "not gay". And sure, they might not be. They might be intravenous drug users and sharing. They may have caught it, as low as the odds are, from an HIV-positive woman and kept "sharing the joy".

An argument for chemical castration.

I don't know what goes through these guys' heads if anything does, but they've got to stop. But then, maybe some of the women knew and it's a straight version of BBBH?

Radio Show Hoaxes

http://shar.es/QLWxZ

New York-area radio hosts apologize for fabricating story about a pair of gay dads who were chastized over young daughter's birthday party invitation

16 FEBRUARY 2014 | BY SYLVIA TAN

You know, part of me wants to blame the radio station. Why, for ratings, would you make something like this up? How long do you let it go on before saying "Well, this isn't real."

Simultaneously, how much research do the outraged do before initiating backlash and making it more than what it really is?